Thursday, August 18, 2011

New Hamphire isn't buying Rick Perry (VIDEO 08-18-11)

As someone who has been involved in New Hamphire and it's politics over the past 28 years, I'm not surprised that Rick Perry walked away from the Politics & Eggs breakfast in Bedford without impressing to many folks. Unfortunately for Perry, most in New Hampshire don't rely on the Fox News version of someone's record. They do their homework first:

Texas Gov. Rick Perry is back in New Hampshire — his second visit in less than a week. But several people — both moderate Republicans and Tea Partiers — who turned out to hear Perry Wednesday were disappointed.

[...]

“The New Hampshire Republicans are moderate Republicans,” said Andy Smith, the director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center. “Conservative on fiscal issues and tax issues and size of government issues, but on social issues, very much moderate to liberal.”

[...]

“I’m not impressed with him,” Condon said. “In New Hampshire, I think folks here were really excited to hear about Gov. Perry. We admire a lot of things that go on in Texas, his job growth there. We were looking for something really good from him, and the fact that he gave a lot of non-answers really does concern me. I know he came in the race late, but I don’t think he’s quite geared up, because he doesn’t have answers to our questions.”

[...]

Testerman does not think Perry helped himself with his appearance Wednesday morning.

“Rick Perry is claiming to have done all this great job creation,” Testerman said. “They’ve been a right-to-work state since 1993. They have very friendly business policies in that state, so I don’t think he can credit himself with it. ”

Apparently, Perry toned down the cowboy schtick for the NH crowd. But in the process, he was so boring I fell asleep during his speech, and again in the Q/A.

Maybe I just didn't get enough sleep last night, but it seems to me that Perry is in a predicament. He either has to be himself to be interesting and engaging--which is off-putting to many of us, or he has to cut the swagger and be completely boring.